Rat
Nitro Member
- Joined
- May 14, 2007
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- Bay Shore, NY
The following is from my out-of-print book. I own all rights. Enjoy.
Tony Schumacher’s career has been so dominating that when you think of Top-Fuel Dragster you think immediately of Tony Schumacher, just like when you think of Funny Car, you think of John Force. A 7-Time Champion, 67 National Event Wins, 8 U.S. National Wins, and over 600 round wins, he has already had a career that is not complete, possibly over complete, but numbers don’t mean as much to him as his pure passion to drive. He has accomplished many impressive things such as a 76 round win season and a 15 national event win season which he fittingly one the Driver of The Year Award for, but two things on his resume may never be forgotten in the sports history. “The Run” is where he set the National E.T. Record running a 4.428 in the final run of the season to win the championship, and winning the title from being 336 points back earlier in the season; two feats that this sport and its fans may never see again. Tony Schumacher will forever be a feared racer for as long as he races.
PK: What does it take to be a successful driver in this class?
TS: Nine amazing people, we call ‘em A + guys. When people ask me I say, “I idiot proofed my racecar.” The fact is I wouldn’t wanna drive my car with my high school buddies working on it, that’s what I’m saying. When it comes down to absolutely having to win at a certain given time, I want those nine guys; that’s how you win races you surround yourself with people that get it. Nobody shows up for a paycheck, they show up because an A + is absolutely mandatory.
PK: Can you take me through what you do on a run from the burnout to the completion?
TS: We start the car, crew chief will get everything set that he wants to set, make sure the cylinders are all working everything where we wants it, then he’ll give me the to go sign. I’ll roll through, lock the clutch, and I’ll give it gas. Now the fuel has a throttle stop, so it won’t allow me to open it all the way, whatever they predetermine. Lift off that, put the clutch in, and get on the breaks softly to keep the fuel from flowing out the front; overflow. Put it in reverse, let it settle down, and back it up real smooth not riding the clutch, so you don’t get anything to hot.
Back up, they’ll stop me, I’ll put it back in forward and I wait. I’m probably a foot back from the pre-stage beam and they set everything up and make sure everything’s where they want it. When I pre-stage, they step away, I pull the fuel pump on, step on the clutch and stage. At that point the light comes on, I open the throttle and I get the car where it wants to be; it’s not always in the middle of the racetrack. I put the car where it has to be on the racetrack and keep it in the groove and pull the parachutes.
PK: What is your favorite race track?
TS: Man that is a really tough question. I won Indy a lot of times, so I enjoy going there, but I really like going to Denver and Sonoma. A couple of beautiful places, the mountains are bitchin’. Englishtown is the biggest east coast race, but I like fishin’ so I end up going the other way.
PK: You are one of the best in the class for having a really great light at any time. How do you stay so focused and what do you attribute to being the most important factor?
TS: I attribute having great other teammates. If you look at my history we won a lot of championships with .060 and .090 lights, we didn’t have to have .030’s and .040’s now. You gotta understand that when my car’s a tenth faster than everybody, I only need a .090 light, but as the cars are getting more uniform, we all have to step it up. Why are my lights good? Cause I read the rulebook and those guys are fast, it makes me go fast.
PK: Do you have any aspirations to drive in another class, or be a crew chief, or a team owner in any class?
TS: No. I like to go for a Funny Car ride, but I enjoy the kings of the sport; Top Fuel.
PK: What is your private ride and does your career as a driver/rider influence any of your daily driving habits?
I have an (Ford) F-250 diesel. I’ve seen more people get hurt in cars than other people, I drive very slow. I got a beautiful family; we wear our seat belts and follow the rules of the road. I get to go fast out here, going 56 mph not’s gonna impress me; going the speed limits fine.
PK: What are your overall feelings on the countdown and is it a good system for the NHRA?
TS: I understand why they did it, there was a time where me and John Force ran away with a lot of championships; we’d lock it up by the time we get to Reading, people didn’t need to watch the last four to five races. However, the year they went to it we rocked the NHRA before that by having to comeback by a 336 point deficit and winning by setting the world record on the last run of the year. It’s absolute staggering irony that after the most intense year ever that they switch to the countdown the following year and then we had to do the same thing next year winning the last run of the year because of the countdown.
PK: Did “The Run” influence any of your feelings as a driver as far as feeling pressure. “Either I run my fastest pass right now, or I smoke the tires and lose the championship.”
TS: I’ll tell the whole world a secret, none of us dream of winning by three car lengths, no baseball player dreams of winning by 40 points and no football player hopes for a blowout game; we all have the same American dream. It’s absolutely mandatory that we perform a miracle, that’s why it’s great and we do it. That was a gift when we had “The Run”, the world record, and we had to win, it the kinda stuff we dream of. Most guys choke on it, but nobody had to tell me to try harder and I didn’t have to tell them to try harder. That was a blessed moment in the history of the sport in my life and i’m telling my grandkids what I did, and what that team pulled off, at that given moment stemmed from 10 years of getting to that moment and being so good that on that moment you were good enough to pull it off; that’s what makes it great.
PK: I think it should have been the top moment of the 60 moments last year. I mean how many times can that happen?
TS: That was a media deal and for all the fans and with all the guys and (Don) Garlits, I’m just happy to be in the same sentence as them. It didn’t win us a car or a prize, and to be in the top five like that was great; that was a great moment in racing.
PK: What are your feelings on the countdown as far as drivers that are locked out of the top ten and perform better than a locked in top ten car?
TS: Bad timing. I’ll give you a great example of that, I should have won 10 races since last year; except the other guy went faster on that particular run. If it wasn’t that way I would of beat ‘em; there’s alotta if’s out there. I can’t tell you how many times I get beat by the quickest run of the weekend and the guy can’t do it again, but he did it that time and that’s the same thing. This is the thing with, you go up, you win, win, win, and right now we’re not winning, we’re leading, but we’re not winning and if you can’t hold your team together and sometimes you gotta get through those rough moments.
A lot of times you’ll see a good team fire people when there not running good, and then they turn it around and run really good again. If they led earlier, maybe they would have been in the top ten. It’s hard to say, it’s in their shoes and that’s the reason for their decisions.
PK: Going into 2009 your team was unfairly considered a huge underdog. How much pressure did that put on you as a driver and a team?
TS: I loved it! If you want to see this driver make mistakes take the pressure away. I’ll make ‘em, we all do, I just don’t like to make them when it’s absolutely mandatory when we need to win and that’s what we proven we’re good at. I like to be known as that driver where if you have the highest pressure situation, pick me to put in that car. People don’t assume I’m gonna make a mistake and it’s good to do that and that doesn’t come from me, it comes from when I sit there and look at those nine guys, there so good at what they do that I don’t wanna be the guy that didn’t get it done.
PK: What are your feelings on the sport’s decision to move to 1000 feet?
TS: You know, that’s a really tough question, I grew up on quarter mile; we all did. I also grew up on watching (Scott) Kalitta race and when he got hurt, killed, there was a period of eight to 10 years when we got in a car they were scary; that’s intense. There still scary, we’re still going fast, but there was a time where I pretty much thought, “We’re gonna crash,” that ain’t good for anybody. If you look at the last ‘60s early ‘70’s Formula 1, guys were getting killed constantly, cars were going faster than the safety had kept up with. At some point we had to make the change, I am of fan of racing to 1,000 feet because there’s still drag racing and if we stayed quarter mile the insurance would of pulled the plug on drag racing; so we benefit from it in the long run.
PK: What championship, win, and single run mean more to you than all the others?
“The Run” is the greatest run in the sport, but winning (the championship) in ’09, beating my old guys by two points that was pretty good because the team that we were told you could not beat, and we beat ‘em. There’s a lot of good moments, beating them in Houston the first time we met up beating them on a holeshot getting it done. For me it’s sucking it up and rising to the occasion in that given moment.
PK: You share something in common with yourself. You originally broke the 330 mph barrier running 330.23 in the quarter mile at Phoenix in ’99. You ran the same exact number to break the barrier in 1000 feet earlier this year at Concord. Is there any difference in the way that it feels setting the barrier between and extra 320 feet and a minus 320 feet?
TS: You are hauling ass to get there 320 feet earlier. 291 to halftrack I think that’s wicked fast. I like to drive with the front wheels in the air, I like when it’s scary, Morgan’s (Lucas) getting used to it. He’s my competitor, but it’s fun to talk to him cause he’s got a bad ass car right now.
PK: Can you say the same for a 4.42 vs. a 3.75?
TS: The difference is when the 4.42 came up you can’t see the scoreboard where when you’re on a 3.75 you can see the scoreboard as you go by. The 4.42 I wouldn’t of moved my eyes cause I had to set a world record. After watching Beckman set a world record (4.66 FC) right in front of me and get beat on a holeshot, that would have been the worst way to go, to go out there and set the world record and lose on a holeshot, lose the championship, and you could of pulled a hat trick off; there was a lot of stuff going through my mind. Take away the world record and just look at the 4.420 and the 3.75, the 4.42 I’d be expected to crash every time; it’s just the way it was and everybody felt that way, it wasn’t just me.
PK: Have you accepted, I believe that your still equal, that you one day may have more # 1 qualifiers than you do wins, at 67?
TS: Yeah.
PK: Either way you’re a win waiting to happen and your teammates seems to give you the best competition, especially Antron.
TS: Yeah, he’s my worst adversary, but we taught him how to do it. It’s not like they developed their own tune up, when they all moved over here they, you know. The most difficult thing for me is that we spend years developing stuff and whoever my dad brings out as a new team, gets it and it’s really, it’s a tough thing to swallow.
Tony Schumacher’s career has been so dominating that when you think of Top-Fuel Dragster you think immediately of Tony Schumacher, just like when you think of Funny Car, you think of John Force. A 7-Time Champion, 67 National Event Wins, 8 U.S. National Wins, and over 600 round wins, he has already had a career that is not complete, possibly over complete, but numbers don’t mean as much to him as his pure passion to drive. He has accomplished many impressive things such as a 76 round win season and a 15 national event win season which he fittingly one the Driver of The Year Award for, but two things on his resume may never be forgotten in the sports history. “The Run” is where he set the National E.T. Record running a 4.428 in the final run of the season to win the championship, and winning the title from being 336 points back earlier in the season; two feats that this sport and its fans may never see again. Tony Schumacher will forever be a feared racer for as long as he races.
PK: What does it take to be a successful driver in this class?
TS: Nine amazing people, we call ‘em A + guys. When people ask me I say, “I idiot proofed my racecar.” The fact is I wouldn’t wanna drive my car with my high school buddies working on it, that’s what I’m saying. When it comes down to absolutely having to win at a certain given time, I want those nine guys; that’s how you win races you surround yourself with people that get it. Nobody shows up for a paycheck, they show up because an A + is absolutely mandatory.
PK: Can you take me through what you do on a run from the burnout to the completion?
TS: We start the car, crew chief will get everything set that he wants to set, make sure the cylinders are all working everything where we wants it, then he’ll give me the to go sign. I’ll roll through, lock the clutch, and I’ll give it gas. Now the fuel has a throttle stop, so it won’t allow me to open it all the way, whatever they predetermine. Lift off that, put the clutch in, and get on the breaks softly to keep the fuel from flowing out the front; overflow. Put it in reverse, let it settle down, and back it up real smooth not riding the clutch, so you don’t get anything to hot.
Back up, they’ll stop me, I’ll put it back in forward and I wait. I’m probably a foot back from the pre-stage beam and they set everything up and make sure everything’s where they want it. When I pre-stage, they step away, I pull the fuel pump on, step on the clutch and stage. At that point the light comes on, I open the throttle and I get the car where it wants to be; it’s not always in the middle of the racetrack. I put the car where it has to be on the racetrack and keep it in the groove and pull the parachutes.
PK: What is your favorite race track?
TS: Man that is a really tough question. I won Indy a lot of times, so I enjoy going there, but I really like going to Denver and Sonoma. A couple of beautiful places, the mountains are bitchin’. Englishtown is the biggest east coast race, but I like fishin’ so I end up going the other way.
PK: You are one of the best in the class for having a really great light at any time. How do you stay so focused and what do you attribute to being the most important factor?
TS: I attribute having great other teammates. If you look at my history we won a lot of championships with .060 and .090 lights, we didn’t have to have .030’s and .040’s now. You gotta understand that when my car’s a tenth faster than everybody, I only need a .090 light, but as the cars are getting more uniform, we all have to step it up. Why are my lights good? Cause I read the rulebook and those guys are fast, it makes me go fast.
PK: Do you have any aspirations to drive in another class, or be a crew chief, or a team owner in any class?
TS: No. I like to go for a Funny Car ride, but I enjoy the kings of the sport; Top Fuel.
PK: What is your private ride and does your career as a driver/rider influence any of your daily driving habits?
I have an (Ford) F-250 diesel. I’ve seen more people get hurt in cars than other people, I drive very slow. I got a beautiful family; we wear our seat belts and follow the rules of the road. I get to go fast out here, going 56 mph not’s gonna impress me; going the speed limits fine.
PK: What are your overall feelings on the countdown and is it a good system for the NHRA?
TS: I understand why they did it, there was a time where me and John Force ran away with a lot of championships; we’d lock it up by the time we get to Reading, people didn’t need to watch the last four to five races. However, the year they went to it we rocked the NHRA before that by having to comeback by a 336 point deficit and winning by setting the world record on the last run of the year. It’s absolute staggering irony that after the most intense year ever that they switch to the countdown the following year and then we had to do the same thing next year winning the last run of the year because of the countdown.
PK: Did “The Run” influence any of your feelings as a driver as far as feeling pressure. “Either I run my fastest pass right now, or I smoke the tires and lose the championship.”
TS: I’ll tell the whole world a secret, none of us dream of winning by three car lengths, no baseball player dreams of winning by 40 points and no football player hopes for a blowout game; we all have the same American dream. It’s absolutely mandatory that we perform a miracle, that’s why it’s great and we do it. That was a gift when we had “The Run”, the world record, and we had to win, it the kinda stuff we dream of. Most guys choke on it, but nobody had to tell me to try harder and I didn’t have to tell them to try harder. That was a blessed moment in the history of the sport in my life and i’m telling my grandkids what I did, and what that team pulled off, at that given moment stemmed from 10 years of getting to that moment and being so good that on that moment you were good enough to pull it off; that’s what makes it great.
PK: I think it should have been the top moment of the 60 moments last year. I mean how many times can that happen?
TS: That was a media deal and for all the fans and with all the guys and (Don) Garlits, I’m just happy to be in the same sentence as them. It didn’t win us a car or a prize, and to be in the top five like that was great; that was a great moment in racing.
PK: What are your feelings on the countdown as far as drivers that are locked out of the top ten and perform better than a locked in top ten car?
TS: Bad timing. I’ll give you a great example of that, I should have won 10 races since last year; except the other guy went faster on that particular run. If it wasn’t that way I would of beat ‘em; there’s alotta if’s out there. I can’t tell you how many times I get beat by the quickest run of the weekend and the guy can’t do it again, but he did it that time and that’s the same thing. This is the thing with, you go up, you win, win, win, and right now we’re not winning, we’re leading, but we’re not winning and if you can’t hold your team together and sometimes you gotta get through those rough moments.
A lot of times you’ll see a good team fire people when there not running good, and then they turn it around and run really good again. If they led earlier, maybe they would have been in the top ten. It’s hard to say, it’s in their shoes and that’s the reason for their decisions.
PK: Going into 2009 your team was unfairly considered a huge underdog. How much pressure did that put on you as a driver and a team?
TS: I loved it! If you want to see this driver make mistakes take the pressure away. I’ll make ‘em, we all do, I just don’t like to make them when it’s absolutely mandatory when we need to win and that’s what we proven we’re good at. I like to be known as that driver where if you have the highest pressure situation, pick me to put in that car. People don’t assume I’m gonna make a mistake and it’s good to do that and that doesn’t come from me, it comes from when I sit there and look at those nine guys, there so good at what they do that I don’t wanna be the guy that didn’t get it done.
PK: What are your feelings on the sport’s decision to move to 1000 feet?
TS: You know, that’s a really tough question, I grew up on quarter mile; we all did. I also grew up on watching (Scott) Kalitta race and when he got hurt, killed, there was a period of eight to 10 years when we got in a car they were scary; that’s intense. There still scary, we’re still going fast, but there was a time where I pretty much thought, “We’re gonna crash,” that ain’t good for anybody. If you look at the last ‘60s early ‘70’s Formula 1, guys were getting killed constantly, cars were going faster than the safety had kept up with. At some point we had to make the change, I am of fan of racing to 1,000 feet because there’s still drag racing and if we stayed quarter mile the insurance would of pulled the plug on drag racing; so we benefit from it in the long run.
PK: What championship, win, and single run mean more to you than all the others?
“The Run” is the greatest run in the sport, but winning (the championship) in ’09, beating my old guys by two points that was pretty good because the team that we were told you could not beat, and we beat ‘em. There’s a lot of good moments, beating them in Houston the first time we met up beating them on a holeshot getting it done. For me it’s sucking it up and rising to the occasion in that given moment.
PK: You share something in common with yourself. You originally broke the 330 mph barrier running 330.23 in the quarter mile at Phoenix in ’99. You ran the same exact number to break the barrier in 1000 feet earlier this year at Concord. Is there any difference in the way that it feels setting the barrier between and extra 320 feet and a minus 320 feet?
TS: You are hauling ass to get there 320 feet earlier. 291 to halftrack I think that’s wicked fast. I like to drive with the front wheels in the air, I like when it’s scary, Morgan’s (Lucas) getting used to it. He’s my competitor, but it’s fun to talk to him cause he’s got a bad ass car right now.
PK: Can you say the same for a 4.42 vs. a 3.75?
TS: The difference is when the 4.42 came up you can’t see the scoreboard where when you’re on a 3.75 you can see the scoreboard as you go by. The 4.42 I wouldn’t of moved my eyes cause I had to set a world record. After watching Beckman set a world record (4.66 FC) right in front of me and get beat on a holeshot, that would have been the worst way to go, to go out there and set the world record and lose on a holeshot, lose the championship, and you could of pulled a hat trick off; there was a lot of stuff going through my mind. Take away the world record and just look at the 4.420 and the 3.75, the 4.42 I’d be expected to crash every time; it’s just the way it was and everybody felt that way, it wasn’t just me.
PK: Have you accepted, I believe that your still equal, that you one day may have more # 1 qualifiers than you do wins, at 67?
TS: Yeah.
PK: Either way you’re a win waiting to happen and your teammates seems to give you the best competition, especially Antron.
TS: Yeah, he’s my worst adversary, but we taught him how to do it. It’s not like they developed their own tune up, when they all moved over here they, you know. The most difficult thing for me is that we spend years developing stuff and whoever my dad brings out as a new team, gets it and it’s really, it’s a tough thing to swallow.
